The 18-year-old accused of killing three girls at a dance class in Southport has admitted the attack on the first day of his trial.
Axel Rudakubana, of Banks, Lancashire, was to stand trial at Liverpool Crown Court on Monday charged with 16 offences, including three counts of murder of Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven.
The defendant, who was 17 at the time of the attack, admitted their murders as well as the attempted murders of eight other children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, class instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes.
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Following his guilty plea, new details have emerged about Rudakubana, including that he had shown violent behaviour at school and had been referred to the counter-extremism scheme three times.
Read the full reports following his guilty plea and the impact of the riots sparked by the murders from Yahoo’s media partners below
> Killer was referred to counter-extremism scheme three times
> Southport attacker showed violent behaviour in school
> How violence-obsessed teen unleashed horror
> How the Southport stabbings sparked violence across the UK
> How a deadly attack changed a town
Killer was referred to counter-extremism scheme three times
Axel Rudakubana. (PA)
The teenager who murdered three young girls at a dance class in Southport was referred three times to Prevent, the government’s scheme to stop terrorist violence, the Guardian has learned.
One of the referrals followed concerns about Axel Rudakubana’s potential interest in the killing of children in a school massacre, it is understood.
Southport attacker showed violent behaviour in school
Rudakubana in court. (PA)
The teenager who killed three girls in a stabbing at a Southport dance class showed violent behaviour while in high school, it is understood.
The teenager, who is diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, is believed to have left Range High School in Formby in around 2019, before moving to a specialist school.
Teachers at the specialist school, which was within the borough of Sefton, were concerned about Rudakubana’s behaviour and his violence towards others, it is understood.
How violence-obsessed teen unleashed horror
The Southport victims (left to right) Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Alice da Silva Aguiar. (PA)
When Axel Rudakubana got into a taxi in summer last year, the country had no clue of the horrors he was about to unleash on the town of Southport.
The then 17-year-old travelled by taxi to the Hart Space, where he ambushed a class of children aged between six and 11 who were starting their summer holidays at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Merseyside.
The frenzied attack, launched at around 11.50am on 29 July, was described as like a scene from a disaster film when he targeted the girls while a teacher and a grandfather nearby bravely tried to defend the screaming children.
How the Southport stabbings sparked violence across the UK
A police car being set on fire as Far-right activists held an ‘Enough is Enough’ protest in August 2024. One of many violent events sparked by the Southport killings. (Getty Images)
Within hours of his attack, posts spread on the internet which claimed the suspect was a 17-year-old asylum seeker, who had come to the country by boat last year.
As floral tributes near the scene grew, so did speculation about who was behind the attack. By that evening, things began to turn violent.
A crowd gathered outside Southport mosque – which has no known links to Rudakubana – for a planned protest on the evening of July 30.
How a deadly attack changed a town
A mother hugs her child as they look at floral tributes for the victims of the knife attack in Southport. (Getty)
“Southport is a quiet, kind place in which nothing ever happens,” said the Rev Thomas Carter, the morning after it happened. “People are struggling to understand it.”
It wasn’t just Southport; the whole country struggled to process the carnage that took place late on a sunny Monday one week into the school holidays.
